In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
- Genesis 1:1
On March 24, 2021, ABC News ran the headline “Rachel Levine confirmed by Senate, become highest ranking openly transgender official.“
It wasn’t many years ago that such a thing – the Senate confirmation of a transgendered person for high government office - would have been impossible. But in 2021 America, Levine’s confirmation was inevitable.
A month earlier, the conservative website Revolver ran an article correctly predicting Levine’s confirmation. The piece stated that, “Rachel Levine’s imminent confirmation proves Transgenderism is America’s new state religion. The article went on to note,
Fifty years ago, the cult of transgenderism didn’t even exist. Merely ten years ago, it was still so obscure most Americans knew nothing about it. But over the past decade, transgenderism has been accepted en masse by the centers of power in America, which are now imposing them on the whole country. The core parts of its doctrine are easy to list:
· Physical sex and “gender identity” are completely unrelated to one another.
· Being “cisgender” and “transgender” are equally ordinary.
· Gender is “fluid” and there are far more genders than merely “male” and “female.” In fact, there may be infinite genders.
· Gender roles are socially constructed, and there is no biological basis for behavioral differences between males and females.
· Despite the above, a person can also innately know that they were assigned the “wrong” gender, even if this is based on their failure to conform to gender norms that are, supposedly, only social constructs.
· A person can know he is transgender at any age. It is completely normal for teenagers, preteens, and even toddlers to become “transgender,” with potentially invasive treatments like puberty-blocking pills and even surgery.
· A person has the right to choose their own pronouns, to demand that others “state their pronouns,” and to demand punishment when their pronouns are not respected.
· Not only may a person change his name at any time, but it is “deadnaming” to use or even mention a prior name.
By this time, you may be wondering why, in a post about the Biblical account of the creation of man, I’m writing about transgenderism. My reason for doing so stems from the stated purpose of this series. As I wrote in Part 1, “It is my intention in this series to apply the revealed history found in Genesis to the current moral, political, scientific, and economic problems of our day, refuting the contemporary confusion and setting forth the mind of God on these issues.”
Nowhere is the confusion of our age more evident than in the matter of transgenderism, and nowhere is the mind of God in more desperate need of application.
Male and Female He Created Them
In Genesis 1:27 we read, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.”
This one verse goes a long way to clearing up our present-day transgender confusion. In combination with other passages, it decisively refutes the transgender agenda which, as the Revolver article quoted above notes, has been accepted en masse by the centers of power in America, which are now imposing them on the whole country.”
For example, there is no hint that, “Physical sex and ‘gender identity’ are completely unrelated to one another.” There are men and there are women. In Genesis 2:7 we read, “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” Later in Genesis 2, we read, “And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone: I will make him an help meet for him…And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.”
Someone may object at this point that the first core premise of transgenderism listed above – physical sex and “gender identity” are completely unrelated to one another – has not been refuted. “After all,” they may argue, “the text speaks only of Adam and Eve’s physical sex, not their gender identity.”
Yes, that’s true. But we’re not done yet.
Genesis 2:23-24 help to build the case against transgenderism. There we read, “And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”
There is no hint whatsoever in this passage that the terms “man and woman” mean anything other than the standard definition of the terms. Adam was physically a man and understood himself to be so. Likewise, Eve was physically a woman and understood herself to be so.
Further, in Deuteronomy 22:5 we read, “The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman’s garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the LORD thy God.”
This knocks out the idea that “physical sex and ‘gender identity’ are completely unrelated to one another.” Very clearly, they are related to one another, otherwise the prohibition of men dressing as women and women dressing as men would make no sense. Trans women – trans woman is a biological male who identifies as a woman – are not women. They are men who are deceiving themselves and others.
In the New Testament, there are several passages that clearly condemn homosexuality and, by implication, also condemn transgenderism. Of these passages, the one offering the clearest condemnation of transgenderism is 1 Corinthians 6:9-10. Writes Paul, “Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind…shall inherit the kingdom of God.” In place of the terms “effeminate” and “abusers of themselves with mankind,” the New King James Version uses “homosexuals” and “sodomites.”
The Greek word translated as “effeminate” by the KJV and “homosexuals” by the NKJV is malakos, the basic meaning of which is soft or effeminate. This word can also be used to refer to passive male homosexuals, that is, those who submit to acts of homosexuality. The NKJV provides “catamite” as an alternate translation of malakos. Put another way, a malakos is someone who plays the female part in a male, same-sex relationship. That is to say, the malakos is a man pretending to be a woman. This is exactly what transgenderism is. Such people, says Paul, “shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”
These passages also eliminate the third point of transgenderism – gender is “fluid” and there are far more genders than merely “male” and “female.” In fact, there may be many genders. For that matter, they eliminate all the basic tenants of transgenderism, including the bizarre pronouns that have been invented by transgender advocates to avoid the use of standard male and female ones.
The Scriptures teach that there are two sexes, male and female. The notion that there is a thing called “gender” which is divorced from one’s physical sex is unknown in the word of God. Because of sin, many confused people behave in ways that are sexually deviant and the Bible lists these out in some detail. Among the deviant sexual behaviors listed in the Bible are: adultery, fornication, homosexuality, crossdressing, bestiality and incest. But simply because some confused people make claims about their gender, this in no way obligates Christians to believe them.
Hated by the World, Rewarded by God
As Christians, we are told to test all things and hold fast what is good. The standard for Christian testing is, and always has been, the 66 books of the Bible, the revealed, infallible, and inerrant Word of God. And these 66 books deny every one of the claims of the transgender advocates.
In our own time, the world appears to be spiraling into madness of the sort that we seen occur from time to time in history. This is a dangerous time for Christians, as the man who holds to a Biblical understanding of men, women and marriage is bound to run headlong into the evil agenda that is being imposed upon society from above. As the Revolver article noted, the tenants of transgenderism have, “been accepted en masse by the centers of power in America which are now imposing them on the whole country.” And what is happening in America is happening throughout the formerly Christian West.
But as Christians, we are called to be salt and light in this dark and dying world. We do not have the option to ignore sin. We do not have the right to call good evil and evil good. We do not have the choice of remaining silent. But condemning sin is only part of the job of being salt and light. We also have the Gospel, the good news, of Jesus Christ to declare. Through faith in him, sinful men and women can have their sins forgiven. They can have their debased mind removed and a sound mind restored to them, much as the Gadarene demoniac. Luke 8:26-39 records how Jesus cleansed this madman – Luke records for us that he wore no clothes and lived among the tombs - of demons. When the men of the city heard what had happened and came to see for themselves, Luke tell us that they, “found the man, out of whom the devils were departed, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in his right mind” (emphasis added). You and I live in a civilization that is losing its mind. But we have the cure. By God’s grace, some will listen. As Paul noted in his epistle to the Corinthians cited above, “such were some of you.”
But as the Scriptures also make clear, Christians will not always receive a warm reception when preaching the Law and the Gospel. The world is going to hate us. Jesus promised this would happen. We can count on it. “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said to you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you (John 15:18-20).
But Jesus said this as well, “Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you” (Matthew 5:11-12).
But whether we as Christians are heard or hated, let us be found faithful to our calling. For as Jesus himself said, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.”